


Bloody Beautiful

by jurdanhell



Category: The Folk of the Air - Holly Black
Genre: F/M, Post QoN, QoN - Freeform, ajslkdjfa anyways here we go i guess, holly black - Freeform, if i had to describe this fic in one word, it'd be angst, jurdan - Freeform, tcp, the cruel prince - Freeform, the queen of nothing, the wicked king, this was something that i woke up to my alarm with and it's been haunting me ever since, twk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-14
Updated: 2019-12-14
Packaged: 2021-02-26 00:48:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21774712
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jurdanhell/pseuds/jurdanhell
Summary: there’s a tag marked for graphic descriptions of violence, but i don’t think it’s too bad. i did figure it was better safe than sorry, though. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯Jude & Cardan live in a faerie tale, but is any take on their story true to its ending? It feels like it comes crashing down in one of the most natural ways, by taking what was real and twisting it up into something so insane it’s frightening.Except, it is insane and it was always frightening. So, what’s the difference between nightmares & reality?
Relationships: Jude Duarte/Cardan Greenbriar
Kudos: 38





	Bloody Beautiful

It had been another tedious day of the High Court's design, and by the time they retired to their chambers, both the High King and Queen of Elfhame where exhausted. They had an abundance of meetings that day, to which they tackled through turns of attendance. Cardan had suggested they postpone several of the meetings for later in the week, but Jude saw it through to push through and find themselves done and over with them. She did, however, agree to the canceling of meetings for the remainder of the week.

After stripping off the remainder of the clothes they wore and slipping on something thinner, the pair crawled into their shared bed and slid beneath the coverlets. The sleep that pulled from their shoulders weighed over their bodies as they fell under the grasp of its hold almost immediately after settling in. Sometime throughout the night, however, they had shifted to hold each other. A shift to which neither one protested or argued.

As they fell further into sleep’s grasp, they found themselves succumbing to dreams as well.

_He held her hand. They spun around the room full of revelers in a way that no one else dared to match. Again, and again, and again. He dipped her, she smiled. He spun her, and she laughed. He would do anything to hear that sweet noise part from her lips again._

_Darkness swallowed them until it was just the two of them. She didn’t seem to notice. It wasn’t until she’d disappeared into the darkness as well that he began to worry. If he had her, then everything would be alright. But he didn’t, and nothing was alright._

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_His brother stood before him, and the way he towered over him shook him with a fear that he wished he didn’t remember. He hated how it had settled into his bones so quickly, how it took no time at all to reaccustom himself to it. He hated it, he hated his brother, and he hated himself for letting him feel that way. For feeling inferior._

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_His brother had brought a lash that he’d held in his hand up over his head. He didn’t notice that he’d had it. He closed his eyes, waiting for the lash that would never come. Instead, it was tangled around a sword, inches away from his face. He turned to the owner of the sword, surprised that it wasn’t aimed at him. But, maybe it was._

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_No, no. It was her. She’d emerged from the darkness and he hadn’t even noticed. Maybe he didn’t want to. Maybe it was the change in her posture, the way she held herself, the way she’d held her sword. Maybe it was the look in her eyes as she challenged him. Challenged his brother._

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_“No.” She’d said. It’d been the first thing anyone had spoke and he understood why. Her voice echoed like it would off a chasm wall, although it seemed there was nothing but darkness for miles. It sounded ghastly, ghoulish, even. He hated the way her voice shook everything around her. It was sweet like a caress and held every ounce of authority he believed she had. It was firm and final and even._

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_With a small flick of her wrist, the lash that had been wrapped along her blade had landed at his feet, and as his vision trailed to it, memories played behind his eyelids. One’s he’d worked hard to push down. Deep, deep down where he could forget them. He didn’t._

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_He looked away, hoping to find something, anything else to change his train of thought. But he wasn’t in the darkness anymore. He was in the palace gardens, and he wasn’t alone. He watched silently as she dueled with his brother, her sword gone and replaced by a much smaller blade._

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_Her body danced in ways he hadn’t imagined it could, as the length of her blade seemed to shrink in comparison to his proper sword. He wanted to step in, to intervene. He took a step forward, but no words fell from his lips, no matter how many times he tried. He took another, and he had to admit that he was closer than he’d like to be, although neither one seemed to notice his presence. Didn't seem to notice where they were, or that someone could catch them and break them apart at any time. Not that that would stop them._

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_He took another step, and another until he was close enough to place a hand on her shoulder. He didn’t though, because he was frozen in place. He had known what had happened, and he’d imagined millions of different ways it could have happened. This wasn’t exactly one of them though._

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_There was red, and it was everywhere. It stained his clothes, the ground. It stained him. She’d ran her blade through his throat, even as he’d tried to yield. It didn’t matter, though. Because he’d never finish that sentence, and she’d never let him._

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_She looked shocked. Not in a way that said ‘oh my gods I just killed somebody,’ but something that told him that she hadn’t exactly meant to. It wasn’t that she was angry, or even torn over the fact that she’d just killed a person. It was that she was driven by instinct, and instinct alone. It was an instinct that told her to fight, even though she knew it was foolish. It was an instinct that kept her from yielding, even though she knew she could get hurt. It was an instinct that drove her blade through his throat, even though she didn’t exactly mean to. In her mind, she had a dozen good reasons as to why it was justified, and although she’d known it would hurt him, she’d pushed it deep down inside her where she hoped to never find it again. Deep down next to that little girl that was still afraid of her own shadow. The one that still lived inside her, even though she pretended she didn’t. The one that she was afraid of. The one that haunted her._

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_She’d pushed his brother’s body away from her, and took a staggering step backward and tripped over the skirts of her dress. He’d caught her without a second thought, and it wasn’t until then that she’d noticed him. She stood, turned, and allowed a smile to cross her face. Eyes alight with something he’d rarely seen. She smelled of blood, but_ that damn smile. 

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_She took her hands in his. They were unusually warm for her, they felt wet. She smelled like iron. Risking a glance into what he knew was an awful idea, he’d confirmed yet another one of his fears. Her hands were sticky red with wet blood, and she hadn’t even noticed. It was as if it were water to her. As if she could wash blood off with blood and somehow that’d make her hands cleaner._

Cardan shook himself awake at the thought, forced himself out of his dream haze. He still smelled blood, the heavy iron that blanketed the air. He could still see her smile, _that damn smile,_ that held him even through his waking hours. 

He’d felt a hand lazily tighten on his, and he’d looked down without too much thought. Instead, he found his sleeping wife sprawled out across him. He wasn’t complaining.

But when he’d noticed her hand in his, all he could see was red.


End file.
